Merry Christmas from UKC, UKH and Rockfax

by Alan James - UKC and UKH Dec/2013This news story has been read 6,659 times

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from UKClimbing.com, UKHillwalking.com and Rockfax.

Santa getting some winter sun action in at Marin on the CostaBlanca. Photo: Mike Hutton

2013 has been another great year for us. For UKC we have once again set new 'highest ever' figures for each of the metrics we use to measure site traffic and we currently have 66,545 registered readers. UKH has shown particularly impressive increases with visits up by 35% and unique visitors up by 48%.

At Rockfax we have produced two new books - Spain : Costa Blanca and North Wales Climbs. Both of these have been well received and are proving to be very popular. 2014 will see our most exciting new development for years with our Rockfax App being developed for iOS and Android. For more news on what's planned at Rockfax read this news item.

We are also planning on developing UKC and UKH. This will include some cross-site layout work plus major changes to the Logbook system (yes, I know we have promised this before) which will link in with the Rockfax App development.

Staff Changes for 2014

We have had a few staff changes during 2013 and have some more to come. In May Sarah Stirling left the team and Mick Ryan will be leaving at the end of the month. Mick has been with UKC since 2005 initially as Editor (only staff member at that time) and then he moved onto Advertising Manager in 2007. Mick was key to a lot of the development of the site over the last 8 years and we wish him every success in his future ventures.

Rob Greenwood

The Advertising Manager's vacancy is being filled by Rob Greenwood who starts in January. Rob has been working as Regional Development Officer at the BMC for the last 8 months. Before that he was a sales rep for DMM, and store manager for Joe Brown Shops. Rob brings a wealth of experience in the Outdoor Trade to the position and we are looking forward to working with him in 2014.

Also coming on the payroll will be Dan Bailey in a permanent position continuing his role as Chief Editor for UKHillwalking. It will be great to get Dan on the team on a more long term basis to continue his work on UKH.

We have also been helped by Duncan Campbell for the last few months as Assitant News Editor. Duncan will be continuing in this role to help with news and editorial as Jack Geldard takes on the role of Gear Editor in addition to his UKC Chief Editor position.

All in all things are looking very bright at UKC, UKH and Rockfax and we are very excited about what 2014 has to offer. We would like to thank everyone who visits the site for their contributions, forum posts, photos, logbook entries and feedback during the year.